Shame about the fan, but the lower height and offset design are more than welcome for today's builds with ever more compact setups and subsequent tight fits. This will definitely be a personal favourite.

"We weren't able to find any concrete information on pricing but the original Cogage True Spirit is still being sold at some retailers for about US$40. If the latest version is priced near or under that mark, it's a fairly good value. However, it would not be our first choice unless it meets a height requirement that its larger competitors do not; cases with side fans near the CPU area come to mind."

Given that this edged past the Noctua and Prolimatech in single reference fan configurations, what would your first choice be and why?

Given that this edged past the Noctua and Prolimatech in single reference fan configurations, what would your first choice be and why?

this

Since this popped up again, I'll toss in my two cents.

I read the original conclusion as favouring the large heatsinks, i.e. "[the TRUE Spirit 120M] would not be our first choice unless it meets a height requirement that its larger competitors do not" = larger competition preferred over this heatsink, unless height is an issue. The Editor's Choice coolers are probably the first choice, no?

As nice (practical) as this heatsink is, I doubt it can serve as the same be-all and end-all solution that something like a Macho would be. The Macho can be had for 42 euros here and the Spirit 120M for 28, but considering you may not have to swap out the Macho's fan, the difference is very small in the end (more like 36 to 42). The Macho can handle any setup in acoustic comfort, and the light setups that the Spirit 120M could be run silently with the Macho might be able to cool passively or semipassively. This difference becomes very apparent when you run something like folding in the background or work with CPU-intensive software (or of course a heavily overclocked CPU in certain games, but there you usually have game sound to mask computer noise).

From a sheer cooling and acoustic performance and bang/buck perspective the Editor's Choice coolers make the most sense, I would think, but it would be nice to compare the cream of the crop from the Small category to the Big Editor's Choices.

Unfortunately that is a tough call to make since in the relative performance chart provided in this article, this cooler looks to be top of the heap. The other chart, which has the big units, is based on a hotter CPU and thus not directly comparable. Also, lots of the leading coolers in the big chart are older and may not even be available. Can't look at the Recommended Heatsinks article because it is rather out of date. So the question of "what would you recommend then" is quite valid, since the answer is hard to find.

Unfortunately that is a tough call to make since in the relative performance chart provided in this article, this cooler looks to be top of the heap. The other chart, which has the big units, is based on a hotter CPU and thus not directly comparable. Also, lots of the leading coolers in the big chart are older and may not even be available. Can't look at the Recommended Heatsinks article because it is rather out of date. So the question of "what would you recommend then" is quite valid, since the answer is hard to find.

This post is a relevant summary. The TRUE S120M perhaps really deserves at least a recommendation -- it is after all, a very good performing cooler, better than just about anything we've tested on the 1155 platform. How does it really fare against the big guns tested on the hotter 1366 platform? Probably not great against the best of that lot, but competitive with those a step down. The quality of the fan is an issue.

If we go to the question of real-world performance, several factors pop up:1. 130W+ CPUs simply aren't much in vogue. I can't think of any reason to buy one of those, whether Intel 1366, 2011 or AMD, at least not for gaming or typical desktop use, can you? 1155 and FM2 chips can do everything most of us need a CPU to do. They are all sub-100W in real use, often barely 60W. This suggests that our 130W heatsink test platform is not really realistic any more. 2. If the above is accepted, then many of the oversized expensive heatsinks we've paid such detailed attention to over the years really are not very necessary any more. The combination of a very high SQ (sound quality) fan and a moderate size tower might be exactly what most of us need to get both safe cooling under high load and extremely low-to-inaudible noise almost all the time.

Seems to me that the 130W setup is still of value for anyone overclocking a current 77 or 95W Intel (or sadly, about any decently performing AMD). Though it is easy to argue that isn't this site's target audience.I can't say I see a real need to drop past the 95W setup at this point. Perhaps that just needs to become your new single reference setup. Run a couple of the leading big boys on it to get the delta and carry on from there.

Sounds good! ...or maybe just run the Top 3 (and maybe Bottom 3/Most Popular?) of the Bigs on the 1155 platform (as suggested above)? That way we'll have comparable data, as we can see how the Top 3 did, and compare from there.

I think the Hot platform is still valid for bringing out the best of the best, and making sure any scenario can be faced.

Seems to me that the 130W setup is still of value for anyone overclocking a current 77 or 95W Intel (or sadly, about any decently performing AMD). Though it is easy to argue that isn't this site's target audience.I can't say I see a real need to drop past the 95W setup at this point. Perhaps that just needs to become your new single reference setup. Run a couple of the leading big boys on it to get the delta and carry on from there.

I agree with this view. Overclocked CPU's still make this high-power testing platform relevant. Though I'm starting to worry if new coolers will be compatible with the old 1366 socket.

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